Walt Whitman - Leaves of Grass

327 Shoulder your duds, and I will mine, and let us hasten forth,
Wonderful cities and free nations we shall fetch as we go.

328 If you tire, give me both burdens, and rest the chuff of your hand on my hip,
And in due time you shall repay the same service to me,
For after we start we never lie by again.

329 This day before dawn I ascended a hill, and looked at the crowded heaven,
And I said to my Spirit, When we become the enfolders of those orbs, and the pleasure and knowledge of everything in them, shall we be filled and satisfied then?
And my Spirit said No, we level that lift, to pass and continue beyond.

330 You are also asking me questions, and I hear you,
I answer that I cannot answer—you must find out for yourself.

331 Sit a while, wayfarer,
Here are biscuits to eat, and here is milk to drink,
But as soon as you sleep, and renew yourself in sweet clothes, I will certainly kiss you with my good-bye kiss, and open the gate for your egress hence.

332 Long enough have you dreamed contemptible dreams,
Now I wash the gum from your eyes,
You must habit yourself to the dazzle of the light, and of every moment of your life.

333 Long have you timidly waded, holding a plank by the shore,
Now I will you to be a bold swimmer,
To jump off in the midst of the sea, rise again, nod to me, shout, and laughingly dash with your hair.

334 I am the teacher of athletes,
He that by me spreads a wider breast than my own, proves the width of my own,
He most honors my style who learns under it to destroy the teacher.

335 The boy I love, the same becomes a man, not through derived power, but in his own right,
Wicked, rather than virtuous out of conformity or fear,
Fond of his sweetheart, relishing well his steak,
Unrequited love, or a slight, cutting him worse than a wound cuts,
First rate to ride, to fight, to hit the bull’s-eye, to sail a skiff, to sing a song, or play on the banjo,
Preferring scars, and faces pitted with small-pox, over all latherers, and those that keep out of the sun.

336 I teach straying from me—yet who can stray from me?
I follow you, whoever you are, from the present hour,
My words itch at your ears till you understand them.

337 I do not say these things for a dollar, or to fill up the time while I wait for a boat,
It is you talking just as much as myself—I act as the tongue of you,
Tied in your mouth, in mine it begins to be loosened.

338 I swear I will never again mention love or death inside a house,
And I swear I will never translate myself at all, only to him or her who privately stays with me in the open air.

339 If you would understand me, go to the heights or water-shore,
The nearest gnat is an explanation, and a drop or motion of waves a key,
The maul, the oar, the hand-saw, second my words.

340 No shuttered room or school can commune with me,
But roughs and little children better than they.

341 The young mechanic is closest to me—he knows me pretty well,
The woodman, that takes his axe and jug with him, shall take me with him all day,
The farm-boy, ploughing in the field, feels good at the sound of my voice,
In vessels that sail, my words sail—I go with fishermen and seamen, and love them.

342 My face rubs to the hunter’s face, when he lies down alone in his blanket,
The driver, thinking of me, does not mind the jolt of his wagon,
The young mother and old mother comprehend me,
The girl and the wife rest the needle a moment, and forget where they are,
They and all would resume what I have told them.

343 I have said that the Soul is not more than the body,
And I have said that the body is not more than the Soul,
And nothing, not God, is greater to one than one’s self is.
And whoever walks a furlong without sympathy, walks to his own funeral, dressed in his shroud,
And I or you, pocketless of a dime, may purchase the pick of the earth,
And to glance with an eye, or show a bean in its pod, confounds the learning of all times,
And there is no trade or employment but the young man following it may become a hero,
And there is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheeled universe,
And any man or woman shall stand cool and supercilious before a million universes.

344 And I call to mankind, Be not curious about God,
For I, who am curious about each, am not curious about God,
No array of terms can say how much I am at peace about God, and about death.

345 I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least,
Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself.

346 Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and each moment then,
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own face in the glass,
I find letters from God dropped in the street—and every one is signed by God’s name,
And I leave them where they are, for I know that others will punctually come forever and ever.

347 And as to you Death, and you bitter hug of mortality, it is idle to try to alarm me.

348 To his work without flinching the accoucheur comes,